


Helpful

by ladyoneill



Series: Lady O's Teen Wolf Bingo Stories [89]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Eichen | Echo House, Gen, Helpful Peter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-10
Updated: 2014-10-10
Packaged: 2018-02-20 14:10:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2431673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyoneill/pseuds/ladyoneill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter's mind heals and he becomes the man he was before the fire, but, trapped in Eichen House, he can't atone for his sins until she visits him, needing his help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Helpful

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Hurt/Comfort Bingo wildcard square where I used "atonement" I seem to be obsessed with Peter in Eichen House. There will be more.

After all the screaming was done, something unexpected came out of staring into Valack's third eye.

Peter's fractured mind healed.

It took a while. No one noticed. By the time his sanity was locked down tight as a drum he'd figured out ways to hide it.

Babbling and drooling, neither attractive, were sure fire ways to keep the doctors from digging too deeply into his psychosis.

Or lack thereof.

As he healed, returned to his true self from before the fire, when he was a mischief maker and a smart ass but not the villain, not evil, he regretted. No one cared what he was crying about, that the tears were for his family, for Laura, for Derek, even for Scott--you didn't kill your Betas even ones who became Alphas, you just didn't.

This level of Eichen House was for incarceration, not rehabilitation or therapy. No one questioned him, no one helped him. The doctors who examined him didn't care if he got better, just that he didn't get worse to the point of being dangerous.

Peter healed on his own and in secret.

And, then, realized he was trapped.

That realization nearly drove him insane again. Curled on the thin mat on the floor of his cell, wrapped in a worn blanket, he rocked, not only to give an outward manifestation of insanity, but because he was scared. 

Scared he'd never get out of here.

A trapped wolf was dangerous to himself as well as others. Peter needed to run free. As the days slowly dragged by, his mind drifted more and more to the forest, to blue skies and green trees and running with his Pack, his family. It got to the point he could almost taste the clean air on his tongue, smell the odors of leaf mold and blooming flowers, feel pine needles and cold water and stone beneath his fingers.

He was going mad again.

And, just at that pinnacle moment, something changed.

Even with the wolfsbane laced drugs dulling him, he felt her coming. Through the mountain ash laced glass he heard her long before she reached this subterranean prison. Her scent tickled his nose, making him stumble to his feet over to the glass wall, unable to touch it, but coming as close as possible.

At the end of the long hall a door opened and, accompanied by two orderlies--more guards than nurses--she strode confidently to his cell.

As soon as she stopped and faced him, Peter saw the truth. Her boldness was an act. Although nothing physical, no fidgeting or facial tics gave her away, he knew her to the bone, and she was nervous.

And her exquisitely applied make up failed to hide from him the lines at her mouth, the dark shadows beneath her eyes.

She'd lost weight as well. Her designer dress hung just a bit too loose and her cheekbones were a bit more sharp.

"What do you need?" he asked softly. It wasn't want that brought her, but desperation. He could smell it on her.

"Everyone told me this was a mistake, that you were insane, a crazed manipulator, a murderer, that you'd never help us." While everything else about her seemed dulled, her eyes remained sharp and shrewd and zeroed in on his, trapping him as easily as this cage.

"What do you need?" he repeated, one hand rising to rest a millimeter from the glass he couldn't touch.

Hers pressed to the opposite side, fingers spread as if to wrap around his. "Help."

The old Peter would have made a bargain, promised assistance for payment of some kind. 

But that Peter was dead, finally burned away by the fire from so long ago.

"Tell me."

Her eyes flickered to one of the guards. "Let me in there with him."

"Miss, we can't," he protested, appalled, but then Peter himself was surprised by her request.

"That was part of the deal we made. A comfortable monetary settlement and full access to Peter Hale in exchange for not suing this hell hole into bankruptcy and foreclosure," she replied, acid and sugar on her tongue.

Interesting.

The guard looked disgruntled, but then shrugged and pushed the buttons on the keypad to open a narrow door in the glass. "Your funeral."

She was barely through before it closed again and the two guards moved to lean against the opposite wall, bored and uncaring if Peter tore her apart.

The scent of her delicate perfume filled his nostrils and they flared. He knew his eyes flashed as well, but she really wasn't scared of him.

"Risky."

Shrugging her shoulders she took a bent photograph from her dress pocket--they hadn't allowed her to bring her bag down here--and handed it to him. "We don't know what this is, but it's sucking the brains out of homeless people."

The image was blurry, grey and indistinct, but familiar.

"Did you look through the records in the vault?"

"Of course." Her scathing look almost made him smile.

"Did anyone bother to look through my books in my condo?"

That startled her and he huffed slightly. "Derek has a key. Look for Rinehold's Compendium. I think what you're looking for might be in there. It's in German."

"I read German."

"Of course." He handed her back the picture.

"So, what do you want in return?" She asked after replacing the picture in her pocket and crossing her arms over her chest.

Nothing. He wanted nothing but to make amends for everything he'd done, but he didn't know how to explain that to her, so he only said, "I just want to help." There was no surprise or distrust on her face, only a glitter in her eyes. "But, then you knew that when you came."

Since the bite and the spell, there had been a bond between them, not of Alpha and Beta, not of mates, not of Pack, but something unique. Without any rationale behind it, Peter was one hundred percent confident that she knew he wasn't insane.

That she could trust him.

He watched as her eyes moved around the practically empty cell, passing quickly over the metal toilet and sink, lingering on the sorry excuse for a bed. With a frown, she turned and gestured for the guards to let her out.

She didn't thank him, but he hadn't expected that.

*****

The next day with his lunch tray Peter found his own copy of "A Dance With Dragons" which he'd barely begun before his incarceration. Settling on his mat and picking at the limp sandwich, he opened to the bookmarked page and, with a smile on his face, began to read.

Later he wondered when she'd come back with another need for help, and, if he helped her, if it would bring him closer to atoning for every wrong he'd done in the last year.

Maybe she'd bring another book.

Or a smile.

Maybe some day he'd get out of here.

End


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